"In Which We Meet Mr. Jones" | |
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Fringe episode | |
Episode no. | Season 1 Episode 7 |
Directed by | Brad Anderson |
Written by | |
Production code | 3T7656 |
Original air date | November 11, 2008 |
Running time | 50 minutes |
Guest appearance(s) | |
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"In Which We Meet Mr. Jones" is the seventh episode of the first season of the American science fiction drama television series Fringe. The story begins when a FBI agent collapses from a parasite constricting his heart, and Olivia must meet with biochemist David Robert Jones (Jared Harris) in Frankfurt in order to find a cure. It featured the first appearance by Harris.
The episode was written by J. J. Abrams and Jeff Pinkner, and directed by Brad Anderson. The writers designed it to serve as the foundation for the "next chapter" in the season's narrative.
It first aired in the United States on November 11, 2008 on the Fox network to an estimated 8.61 million viewers. Reviews of the episode were mostly mixed.
Agent Mitchell Loeb (Chance Kelly), a friend of Broyles (Lance Reddick), is on a group mission in Weymouth, Massachusetts but fails to find evidence of wrongdoing in a truck they targeted. Loeb and Broyles are in a meeting afterwards when Loeb collapses, seemingly of a heart attack or seizure. He is rushed to the hospital, where the medical staff cut open his chest, only to find his heart is being constricted by an engineered parasite. The Fringe division of Olivia, Walter, and Peter are briefed by Broyles, who then shows them the hospitalized Loeb.
At Harvard, the Bishops run tests on Loeb while Olivia talks with Loeb's wife Samantha (Trini Alvarado). Not recognizing the parasite, Walter pokes it with a blade in an attempt to remove it, and it constricts tighter around Loeb's heart, further endangering his life. Walter is able to get a tissue sample, while Peter administers some medicine to calm Loeb's heart. After a DNA analysis, Walter discovers a pattern "too organized to be accidental, too perfect to be natural." Astrid thinks it is a Caesar cipher, and she and Olivia decipher the acronym "ZFT". After talking with Broyles, Olivia is directed to talk to David Robert Jones (Jared Harris), a biochemist being held incommunicado in "Wissenschaft Prison", Frankfurt, Germany ("Wissenschaft" is German for "science"). Broyles explains to her that ZFT are privately funded cells in 83 recorded countries that traffic in scientific progress, not weapons or drugs. Some fringe events in previous episodes may have been orchestrated by this group. He says little else is known.